


Ebi & Branwen

by synvamp



Category: RWBY
Genre: Action, Blood, Clover has a couple of close calls, Cops AU, Drama, Fair Game Week 2021, Flirting, Fluff, Hook Up, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mild Angst, Past Character Death, Past Injuries Referenced, Scars, Swearing, Tyrian Callows being his usual delightful self, a lil sauce, but you should know by now that I can only do happy endings, hospital stay, injury (not major), prompts taken - modern / breaking rules / charms / cold
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-15
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-24 06:34:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30068145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/synvamp/pseuds/synvamp
Summary: Clover is rushing to catch his train on a busy morning when a mysterious stranger saves his life. He manages to find out the man’s name, Branwen, only to be ordered to forget it. Fate has other plans.A killer on the loose, a storm on the way & only one bed – time to get our favourite tropes on for Fair Game Week 2021! I know it's too early but I really wanted to share some Clover love. This fic will be about 10 chapters and I've written 6 so far, so I promise I'll still have goodness for you when FGW rolls around XD
Relationships: Qrow Branwen/Clover Ebi
Comments: 7
Kudos: 27





	Ebi & Branwen

\---xxx---

One eye on his watch and one eye on the platform, Clover waded through the morning crush. An angry looking woman in a bright yellow mackintosh glared up at him and he stepped to one side to let her past. Poor thing can’t have been younger than eighty and she was only five feet tall. How she even got this far in rush hour was a bit of a mystery. He could feel his messenger bag sliding down his arm so he lifted his coffee high into the air in the hope that the bag would slide back towards his shoulder. He could hear his train coming. Frantic eyes fixed on the LED sign above his head: 8:02 am. If he didn’t really pick up the pace he wouldn’t make it. Normally he was delighted that his train appeared to be the only one on this line which was always on time. Today, he really wished he had the Continental Rail standard 3-5 minutes of grace.

A harried looking mother with a small child stumbled in front of him, chocolate milk slopping from a poorly fixed lid and onto the concrete. The child cried and the mother knelt to comfort her. Clover had to lurch to one side pretty sharply to stop from just steamrolling over the top of them. He stepped out, over the bright yellow safety line which separated this frantic mass of Monday morning from the gleaming steel tracks below. Two steps and a puddle of milk then he’d be around the hazard and back over the respectable yellow authority stripe which seemed to chide him even now.

Was there a shadow in his peripheral vision? Was there a shout of warning? The little details never came back in the weeks and months afterwards. All he remembered was the bright yellow line. A huge weight crushed the air from him, slamming into his back and sending him spinning. He lurched forward and stumbled, his eyes wide with shock as the ground ran out underneath him. There was a kaleidoscope of swirling colour and a steaming arc of coffee as time slowed.

The next thing he knew he was looking at the sky.

_That’s weird_ , he thought to himself. _Why am I lying down? The Chief is going to be so angry if I’m late…_

The world seemed to form around him and in a sudden nauseating jerk, reality crystallised. He could feel the steel track beneath his back, feel his leg twisted the wrong way. He could hear a woman screaming… a high pitched voice laughing… and the train.

Clover snapped his neck around, _the train!_ It was coming fast. He could hear the screeching of metal on metal, the driver had hit the brakes but it wouldn’t stop in time. Clover tried to stand up but his leg was all twisted the wrong way, he dug his fingers down between the slats and tried to drag himself along. His body felt so heavy, the pain in his leg ricocheted through his shaking limbs but he kept fighting. Anything to get out of the path of the train. He managed to make it to the wall which made it to the platform, he could feel his fingernails tearing from their beds as he clawed desperately at the graffiti-covered concrete. He could hear a woman screaming… a child crying… laughter… terrible laughter.

He turned and the train was nearly on top of him. The world slowed and somehow his police officer brain kicked in and he memorised the number plate of the diesel engine that was about to mow him down. At least they would have the footage. At least his friends would know that he’d been pushed. That he didn’t come here to die like so many fallen officers before him.

_That’s it._

_I’m going to die._

Clover closed his eyes and let the air slowly leave his lungs.

Suddenly strong hands gripped under his arms hard and jerked him upwards. He could hear a raspy voice over the engine, over the memory of manic laughter which seemed to have burrowed into his brain. “You’re ok pal, just hold on…”

A million hands reached towards him, pulling his clothing, his hair, anything that they could find to grip. He was dragged up the wall and hefted on the platform. The train thundered behind him, the screaming of the brakes keening in his ears. He lay there for a minute just trying to remember how to breathe, how to move a face which was fixed in a terrified rictus.

“Are you ok?!” a woman asked, lunging into view above him.

Clover gasped and held a hand up, managing to give her a very shaky thumbs up. But where was the person who pulled him from the tracks? The train was bearing down on them so fast!

Ignoring the waves of nausea and the dizzy way the world pitched around him, Clover dragged his head up, “Where… are they…? Are they ok?” he gasped, looking desperately at the side of the train.

“Think this is yours,” a deep voice said behind him. Clover twisted around, closing his eyes as another wave of giddiness rushed through him. When he managed to open his eyes, he was staring at his bag. He lifted a hand and took it, his mind still running on automatic pilot.

“Thank you,” he said. “Did you see who pulled me from the tracks? Are they ok?” he stammered out.

The figure in front of him knelt down. Eyes the shade of sunset blinked slowly. “That would be me. How many fingers am I holding up?” the man said.

He was beautiful. His dark hair was swept away from a strong brow, stubble giving texture to his alabaster skin.

Clover was surprised to hear his own voice answer, “Three.”

He could feel hot tears starting to roll down his cheeks. He scrubbed them out of his eyes, annoyed. He’s been in situations like this so many times. It was stupid to get upset. He was fine. The beautiful man was fine. Everyone was fine.

“Thank you…” he said, trying to find the words.

“Yeah, don’t worry about it. I’m sorry it took a minute but I had to take care of the asshole who pushed you first, in case he wasn’t done yet,” the man sneered down and Clover suddenly noticed a pair of feet next to him. Someone lying on the platform next to him.

“Someone pushed me?”

“Yeah. Won’t be doing that again anytime soon,” he scoffed.

Clover started to ask more questions but then he heard the hammer of feet and then someone was lifting his hand up. Gentle fingers checked his knee, careful hands touched his head.

“Are you able to move your toes? Don’t try to sit up,” a different voice said. Clover could tell the adrenaline was starting to wear off, everything was slowing down… his eyelids were so heavy…

“No, no… don’t go to sleep. Listen to my voice. Sir, you have to come to the hospital with us. You’ve hit your head.”

But Clover couldn’t hear the gentle, soothing matronly tones. His mind had fixed on a voice ringing out behind him. He could only hear snatches of conversation but for some reason just the sound made him feel comforted.

“…out of nowhere… had to crack him… up in an hour or so… camera will back me up… ten minutes… said three fingers… maybe minor concussion… leg is messed up… shift starting… no details… lucky? I don’t know about that.”

When Clover’s mind finally cleared he was tucked up in a gleaming white room in a gleaming chrome bed with gleaming white sheets. The last few hours were a haze of ambulance, emergency department and forms. He had managed to call the Chief and say he wouldn’t be in to work. Apparently, his morning commute had already made him famous at the station. The details of the conversation with his boss were pretty hazy now but he had a vague feeling that there was something important he’d missed.

Doctors came and went. He had a mild concussion, an egg on his head and his leg was broken in five places. Five.

Two thugs from uniform had popped in that afternoon and got his version of events. Jones and Seneca. They hated each other but they’d got better at hiding it after he gave them a pep talk about team work three weeks back. They plodded along through all the standard questions at a snail’s pace. It wouldn’t do to miss anything when you’re interviewing someone who could be your boss one day. When they started to ask him about the man on the platform, a sudden jolt of memory made him feel sick.

“Tyrian Callows. It was Tyrian Callows, wasn’t it?”

The women shifted in their plastic chairs awkwardly. “You didn’t hear it from us, Captain. Did you actually see the person who pushed you at all?” Jones looked back down at her notebook.

Clover sighed, that was the important thing that the Chief had mentioned on the phone. The man who had tried to kill him. The man whose horrifying nasal laughter was now hard-wired into his brain? Tyrian Callows. One of the most wanted men in the country.

“No,” he admitted. “They came up behind me. I was trying to juggle my coffee and I looked away. What was the name of the guy who saved me? Did he apprehend Callows? What the hell happened?”

“Don’t you worry about Callows, Captain. He’s got a nice cosy little cell all to himself. Psych’s coming any minute now and we’ll get him locked up on a mental health order. It’s going to be a long time before he’s out and about,” Seneca flashed a malicious grin.

“Good,” Clover sighed.

“As to your guardian angel, no clue. He talked to the paramedics for a while then left. The Constable who was first on the scene tried to get his details but he said he had to get to work.”

“He didn’t even leave his name?”

“Nope,” Seneca sighed.

“I’d love to know who he was. That footage is something else,” Jones looked wistfully out the window.

_The footage! Of course!  
  
_

“Show me!” Clover said, grimacing as he sat up straighter in bed.

“Yeah, yeah calm down. I told you he’d want to see it,” Seneca grinned.

“It’s a regular romance novel, huh?” Jones scoffed, holding out a tablet with the scene at the railway station displayed in a freeze frame.

Clover rolled his eyes and took the device.

  
“You sure he’s right to…?” Seneca muttered. Jones shrugged. She wasn’t going to try to wrestle with an injured captain. If he wanted the footage, he could have it.

Clover hit the replay. His skin crawled as he watched himself descend the steps and weave through the heaving Monday morning crowd. Behind him, a grainy figure lurked. It was clearly shadowing him. With a growing sense of dread, Clover watched himself step over that gleaming yellow line. He held his coffee out, looked away and the figure behind him lunged. It was so fast. A slamming hip and shoulder and Clover was thrown clear of the crowd, stepped on thin air and then plunged from view.

The CCTV had no sound but Clover could still hear that terrifying laughter. As he watched, Callows doubled over and cackled. The crowd stepped away from him as one, hands pointing, mouths open in horror. A tall, dark figure shot from the side of the platform and Callows began to turn. They fronted each other, fists raised then suddenly there was a foot between them. Callows’s entire body lifted off the ground.

“What a shot,” Seneca muttered in awe.

Callows hit the platform and the man leapt onto the tracks. Clover saw himself lifted by strong hands and then the crowd suddenly snapped from their collective stupor and reached for him, pulling him those last few inches to safety. The train screeched towards them and in the split second before it hit, the other man leapt up onto the platform with an athleticism that was almost inhuman.

He was carrying Clover’s bag. He knelt to speak to Clover, dropped the bag then spoke briefly to the paramedics who were just arriving. Finally, he stepped over Tyrian’s prostrate body, winked directly at the camera, then strolled away.

\---xxx---


End file.
